Pineapple Princesses began as a tribute to Ruby Borrowdale, the home economist behind the 'Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book' tested in the Golden Circle kitchen and modified and updated in the Pineapple Princesses' test kitchens.
As Ruby said "pineapple is a versatile food" . . .
no fat, high in vitamin C and full of the flavour of Queensland sunshine. The blog continues as more and more pineapple recipes are discovered from around the world.

Toast bread on
one side only. Spread untoasted side with mayonnaise, top with a slice of
cheese, a lightly browed steakette, then a slice of pineapple. Sprinkle with
melted butter and reheat under griller before serving. Serve each on a crisp
lettuce leaf and top with a radish (or tomato) rose.

Saturday, 27 October 2012

Our neice Alice and her husband Clinton are working on agricutlural projects in Kenya for 12 months, here is their personal insight into the splendors of local pineapple cuisine.

Pineapple has mostly
been in traditional fruit platters. It is super sweet and delicious here.In other forms, it has really only been in a
salad of mostly grated carrot (which we have at least once a week at the work
kiosk with lunch!) and once it was in an apple crumble.Which was delicious to be honest, with lots
of coconut and raisins etc.A tropical
version of the colonial classic. They love roast chicken here, so any roast
chicken and pineapple dishes, while we haven't had them yet, would be quite
appropriate! I will keep an eye out!

Last weekend we went
to a Brazilian BBQ restaurant with some friends. All the food was amazing, and
we ate ourselves into a bit of a meat coma for the next few days.But the best course of all was a BBQ'd
pineapple coated in cinnamon. They cooked them and served them on long metal
skewers/spears and sliced off pieces directly onto your plate. It was DIVINE! I
don’t know how they kept it so juicy... here are some photos to get your mouth
watering, Alice and Clinton.

Arrange sliced
luncheon beef or camp pie in the centre of a lettuce lined platter. Pile grated
carrot each end and rim with sliced eggs. Arrange sliced tomato along sides,
garnish with cheese shapes, onion rings and peas. Drain pineapple, mounting
slices in pairs round four sides of mound of potato salad. Make “nest” in top
with celery curls and fill with chopped beetroot.

What could be a better location to enjoy a can of Spam than the Hawkesbury River!

Sunday, 21 October 2012

The population of
our little country town was at least quadrupled this weekend when Mumford and
Sons and other fabulous musicians performed at the Showground – but even better
than that our kids, Ella and Ky, came home for the concert with a band of
friends. They were so encouraging about Ruby Borrowdale’s “Golden Circle
Tropical Recipe” book that I chose one of the more unique recipes to taste test
- the Crispy Franks were surprisingly well received, or they were very hungry,
I’m not sure.

Ella was (who
isn’t) keen to try Jellied Pineapple Slices and the shared perception was that
they tasted like “jelly and pineapple”, Anne.

“Pineapple party
time . . . fruity fun starters.”

Island Sparkler.

Place contents of
440g can Golden Circle Crushed Pineapple in saucepan with ½ cup sugar. Cook,
stirring, until sugar dissolves. Remove from stove, add grated rind and juice
of 1 large lemon. Cover, cool and refrigerate. To serve, place dstsp syrup in
glass, add soft drink and scoop of ice cream.

Slice frankfurts
almost through from side to side. Insert wooden skewers. Spread each with sauce
and then roll in fine, dry breadcrumbs. Arrange in foil-lines pan. Press pineapple
pieces into the slits in frankfurts. Bake in moderate oven (150°C) about 20
minutes. Serve hot with additional sauce. Can be pan-fried at barbecue in
melted butter for about 10 minutes on each side.

Reserve ½ cup
syrup from pineapple and combine with soy sauce, garlic and ginger. Pour over
meat cubes and set aside for at least 1 hour. Thread meat cubes on skewers,
alternating with pineapple pieces and stuffed olives. Grill 10 to 20 minutes
and serve very hot. Allow two skewers per serve.

Line deep patty
pans with thinly rolled pastry and place about ¼ tsp jam in each. Drain syrup
off pineapple. Beat the egg and stir it into the softened butter together with
lemon juice, cake crumbs and drained pineapple. Place a spoonful of this
mixture on top of the jam in each tart. Top filling with pastry twists and bake
in a moderately-hot oven (220°C) about 20 minutes, or until pastry is crisp and
filling set. Serve plain, or topped with whipped cream.

Tuesday, 16 October 2012

Inventing the names for the colours of a
Revlon lipstick range or Dulux colour chart or the recipes in Ruby Borrowdale’s
‘Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book’ would be a wonderful occupation! How did
she arrive at "Eggs Flamenco" for this breakfast dish? Anne.

Butter individual
heatproof dishes and line with cooked spaghetti. Break one or two eggs into the
centre of each. Season with salt and pepper. Place a trimmed bacon rasher on
either side of the eggs. Add a spoonful of drained pineapple pieces to each
dish. Bake in moderate oven (180°C) about 30 minutes, or until eggs are set.
Garnish with parsley and serve hot. Serves 2.

Monday, 15 October 2012

The Polynesian meat rolls were good. My
variations: I cooked the rice before mixing it with the meat, from the picture
in the book Ruby’s rolls look a bit crunchy.I made a sweet and sour sauce because the Golden Circle one is not
available here.I used pineapple juice
from the can, some fresh ginger, pineapple, carrots, celery, onion, a little
tomato sauce for colour and a touch of vinegar for “bite”.Thickened with a little cornflour. I would
have put in some capsicum but I didn’t have any and as this was a spur of the
moment recipe I wasn’t inclined to go out to the shop.As I had already cooked the rice I cooked the
rolls in the oven without a lid, there was a lot of stock. They might not look
too glamorous but they were very tasty for a family dinner, Ann.

Saturday, 13 October 2012

Since I’ve started following Kylie’s Blog ‘Lucy Violet Vintage’
I’ve undergone a strange transformation in my op shop-ping habits and have
started walking out with some objects that I would have previously thought
tacky but now consider very beautiful! I’ll be using them in future Pineapple
Princesses photo shoots!

This tea towel belongs to a friend, June, who I suspect has
more treasures in her cupboards! I chose it as a background for a portrait of a
can of rice cream to answer Kylie (the tea towel connoisseur)’squery. There are many brands of canned
ricecream but my husband Les says the cheapest (99c can) is the most delicious.
It contains rice, milk, sugar and vanilla, and I create homemade variety for
breakfast occasionally with left over rice. Ruby was quite keen on it herself
it seems, Anne.

Friday, 12 October 2012

At last I’ve found a dessert I can’t eat! It’s
just too much! Too sweet! But, luckily Les loves ricecream and he even went so
far as to say “I like it” and I think he meant it! I was disappointed as I’d
hoped it would look just like Ruby’s but the after the jellies came out of the
mould the ricecream stubbornly remained behind and had to be scooped out. I’d sat
the mould in warm water but it was in there to stay, maybe realising that it
wasn’t the taste sensation it’d hoped either. I couldn’t even bring myself to
take a photograph at that stage, Anne.

Drain syrup from
pineapple pieces and measure into 2 equal parts. Soak gelatine in cold water
then dissolve over hot water. Stir into ricecream. Turn into jelly mould.
Chill. Add sufficient water to half the pineapple syrup to make 1 ½ cups. Bring
to boil, stir in orange jelly crystals. Cool, add half pineapple pieces, spoon
into jelly mould over ricecream, chill. Prepare lime jelly in same way, adding
remaining pineapple pieces. Set in 20cm cake pan. Chill all until firm. Unmould
lime layer on to serving plate, then unmould the ricecream and orange jelly on
top of lime jelly. Garnish top with cherry.

Monday, 8 October 2012

My friend Elsa swept through my kitchen like a whirlwind to
create a beautiful pineapple cake quite like she would make back home in
Mozambique (she would have preferred fresh pineapple, also I set the oven too
hot unfortunately, so the caramel was a little darker than intended). But it
was truly delicious with a lovely texture! Elsa Licumba has started a catering business in Newcastle NSW if anyone is interested in a special event with an African flavour elsalicumba@gmail.com 0413538959, Anne.

Melt 1 cup of sugar in a saucepan on the stove. Swill around
a warmed 20cm cake tin until evenly coated with caramel. Line the base of the
cake tin with pineapple rings and let the tin cool.

Cream butter and one cup of sugar with an electric beater.
Mix in eggs and vanilla essence. Add plain flour and baking powder. Mix well.
Make sure this mixture is not too runny, but if it is too thick add a little
pineapple syrup. Pour the mix into the cake tin on top of the pineapple and
place in an oven preheated to 180°C
for 45-50 minutes. Don’t open the door for at least the first 20 minutes of
cooking.

Tuesday, 2 October 2012

On request I have included a “gadget” for anyone who would
like to follow this blog – just write your email address into the box on the
right hand side of the page and submit.

jamesahaigh has given us permission to use his atmospheric
photograph of the amazing Dunsmore Pineapple in Scotland. He says “It is a very
unusual building, and apparently was built during the Victorian times as the
area was actually a pineapple grove (not sure if that’s the correct term) but
they used to grow them there. It’s a shame it wasn’t a nicer day but it was in
January and very very cold.”

An impromptu dinner party, some friends of
my pal Robert in town from NZ and Ballarat for a dog show in Canberra.I invited them for dinner and now the party
has grown.

Purchased two 6 inch pastry cases (sorry
Ruby, I failed pastry at school) they were the only ones I could find.I planned to use the individual Sara Lee
sweet pastry cases but they were nowhere to be found.Made up the filling as per the recipe but
added another egg white to the meringue, plus another ¼ cup sugar and ½ cup
coconut.I tinted the meringue a very
delicate shade of pink, the beetroot hue of the book would have put us all off
our dessert, Ann.

The Pineapple Princesses were recently
contacted by a fan of all things vintage who had created a Coral Reef Pie of
her own. Kylie and her family, who live in Perth, weren’t that impressed by the pie
which is why Ann decided to have a go at creating not one but two herself!